Caffeine in tea and coffee, imho it is a definite no-no as It is not an appropriate way to handle sleepiness/drowsiness. According to science it works by blocking Adenosine receptors, Adenosine is widely found in nature and plays an important role in biochemical processes such as regulating blood flow, communicating the need for rest, supresses arousal and promoting sleep. Caffeine has a relatively long half-life, so a buildup of caffeine is almost inevitable for a daily user. Furthermore afaik Adenosine receptors are found in muscles, heart and brain and caffeine affects all of them.

Coffee is increasingly earning scientists’ approval. Studies continue to suggest that the beverage may have some beneficial effects on health.

In the latest analysis, published in the BMJ, researchers scanned nearly 220 studies on coffee and found that overall, coffee drinkers may enjoy more health benefits than people who don’t drink the brew.

The scientists, led by Robin Poole from the University of Southampton in the UK, learned that people who drank coffee were 17% less likely to die early during the study period from any cause, 19% less likely to die of heart disease and 18% less likely to develop cancer, compared to people who did not drink coffee.

Other recent studies have linked coffee drinking to lower rates of heart disease, early death and diseases like liver cirrhosis, type 2 diabetes and even neurological conditions like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease. Poole’s group found that the strongest benefit occurred among people who drank around three cups of coffee a day.

“I think now we can be reasonably reassured that overall, coffee drinking is a safe habit,” says Dr. Eliseo Guallar, professor of epidemiology and medicine at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study.

MORE: Here’s Another Reason to Feel Good About Drinking Coffee

Other studies have tried to tease apart which ingredients in coffee contribute to its health benefits. Those might include its antioxidants, which can combat cancer, and anti-inflammatory compounds, which can reduce the risk of chronic diseases such as heart conditions and even neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s, as well as the risk of liver diseases like cirrhosis and cancer.

While they say that the results support moderate coffee drinking as a relatively healthy habit, both Poole and Guallar say the findings don’t go far enough to prompt anyone to change their coffee-drinking habits in the hopes of improving their health. The study did not confirm, for example, that people who do not currently drink coffee should start adding a cup or two a day in order to lower their risk of getting heart disease or any of the other chronic conditions studied. The data also do not support the idea that current coffee drinkers should drink even more coffee to enhance whatever benefits they might be receiving. Too much coffee, the data suggest, starts to bend the benefit curve back down.

The only negative health effects the review found were among women, who were at slightly higher risk of developing fractures if they drank more coffee, and pregnant women. Pregnant women who drank more coffee tended to have higher rates of miscarriage, more premature births and more babies born with low birthweight than women who drank less coffee, the study found.

MORE: Can Coffee Make Your Workout Easier?

Poole notes that the analysis included a number of different studies, each with different designs, and not all of them may have adjusted for potential confounding effects that could skew the connection between coffee and health outcomes. Coffee drinkers, for example, also tend to smoke more than non-drinkers, and smoking has an effect on early death, heart disease and certain cancers.

The findings should be reassuring for coffee drinkers, as long as they drink in moderation, Poole says. Further studies will hopefully look deeper into the type and amount of coffee that confers the most health benefit.

When I found out that tea has fluoride in it, I went looking around to see what was healthy to drink. Herbal teas are good, especially hibiscus tea, is very healthy and no fluoride. I'm not one of those conspiracy theorists, but black tea does have a high concentration of fluoride, which can be harmful in large quantities. The tea plant naturally captures large amounts of fluoride from the ground. So I did some research on some reputable sites and coffee kept coming back up as a surprisingly healthy beverage, no fluoride, good for the heart and so many things.

So now I drink coffee, hibiscus tea and occasionally some jasmine tea, in that order.

The problem with coffee (as well as tea) is that it is not beneficial for human consumption. Coffee is a stimulant for the nervous system and it had negative 'prana'. Negative prana means that it shifts the 'subtle energies' in the mind downwards into the body. But in meditation that is not something you dont want because you are at your best when subtle energy is shifted as much as possible into the mind. Also coffee just like chocolate contains an alkaloid which is not good for the brain. The brain responds to this toxic product by releasing serotonin. This is why people get the 'feel good' effect from coffee as well as chocolate because the brain reacts to theobromine by releasing serotonin.

Not only coffee but any type of neurostimulant is best avoided in the 8Fold Path as meditation is an essential part of it. Examples of foods which are negative prana include onions, garlic and green pepper.

Over the years I’ve experimented with virtually every coffee-making device, with the exception of the cezve (as I don’t much like Turkish coffee) and the vacuum coffee-maker (which I only recently learned about). Still, despite the insistence of some of my Thai colleagues that nothing beats coffee filtered through an old bowl-wiping cloth...

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I always revert in the end to my good old moka:

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While for grinding the beans I use this nice manual grinder from Vietnam. From time to time people offer me electrical grinders, but I decline their offers as I’ve never known one whose friction didn’t burn the beans at least slightly.

The US Beverage Guidance Panel, independently assembled to provide recommendations on benefits and risks of various beverage categories, found tea and coffee, without creamer or sweetener, tied as the number-two healthiest beverages, second only to water!

More research on the health benefits of tea and coffee is needed, but one thing is for certain: The addition of cream, sugar, whipped cream, and flavorings can turn coffee or tea from a healthful beverage into a not-so-healthful one. https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritions ... ull-story/

While for grinding the beans I use this nice manual grinder from Vietnam. From time to time people offer me electrical grinders, but I decline their offers as I’ve never known one whose friction didn’t burn the beans at least slightly..
grinder.jpg.

And a very impressive grinder it is, Bhante. And the coffee you made me using it last year was excellent!

I have seen those [plungers] and been curious. How fine a grind can you get away with using in those?

Very fine, since coffee grounds eventually sink anyway. (There's a beautiful little article somewhere about the difference in design between teapots and coffee pots. It's called "Tea Rises, Coffee Sinks") The plunger just encourages them to sink and then stops them being swilled out when you pour.

For me, the best trade-off between convenience and quality is the 'plunger' type of pot.

Likewise.

On work days, I'll usually have one homebrew before I leave for work, then a $2 readymade flat white from a cafe on the way to work. Then for brunch (since I usually neither have breakfast or lunch), I'll have a strong flat white as part of a food and coffee combo at a bakery near work. That's usually it, but if I have any more throughout the day, it's usually free push button machine coffee from work.

have tried cold brew making at home...it makes a concentrate to keep in the frig....lowers the acid a bit because the coffee is not heated and cooked...first tried it in the 80s and have started again....

This thread has been a good read, I appreciate all the differing opinions.

I am trying to watch my caffeine consumption very carefully. It is clear to me that there are feelings of craving and attachment mixed up with it. I think there may be some benefits in meditation but only in minute amounts. Unfortunately I am fully addicted to coffee at the moment, so instead of subtle benefits I am dealing with what I see as a more serious issue.